


The Garden

by lilyconrad



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: ABO AU, Alpha Obi-Wan Kenobi, Alpha/Omega, M/M, Omega Anakin Skywalker, obikin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2020-03-05 22:33:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18838126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilyconrad/pseuds/lilyconrad
Summary: Nothing is ever simple with Anakin Skywalker.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Having never written in this type of world before I thought this would be a good writing challenge! Hope I’m not too far afield and that y’all like it... 
> 
> (It’s marked as finished but I’m thinking of two more chapters depending on feedback.)

Captain Rex of the 501st Battalion of the Grand Army of the Republic was having an excellent morning as he strolled down one of the wide hallways of the battle cruiser he served on. The Separatist-installed dictator of the planet below had given up without a fight two days ago, possibly motivated by the arrival of two massive warships that drifted just low enough in the atmosphere to be seen from the royal palace.

No casualties for his men, no injuries himself, and yesterday grateful locals had sent up a cargo ship full of gifts for their rescuers. 

Most of it was food the boys on mess hall duty were getting ready for the next few meals. When it came to what was left, a few crates of thick bottles that sloshed with this planet’s particular method of killing brain cells while having fun doing it, Rex and his counterpart aboard the Negotiator, Cody, had studiously looked the other way while it all disappeared. 

Last Rex had seen this morning, the ARC trooper Fives had been wheeling a dolly through barracks and handing out a suspiciously similar bottle to each squad leader along with a personalized insult. Rex had hung around with his hand out to wait for one, and when Fives rolled the squeaking dolly up to him, he had raised an eyebrow with a grin.

“You about to call me stupid, trooper?” 

“Well, you did let me into the 501st, sir.”

Rex had laughed along with everyone else, and the bottle now sat in the war room with Cody and General Kenobi as they considered the best way to help the world below set up defenses in case the Separatists didn’t take the hint the first time.

Skywalker was supposed to be there too, but this wouldn’t be the first time he’d overslept and wasn’t answering his com. Rex didn’t blame him at all given how hard Skywalker always fought and how rare days like this came anymore in the ongoing grind of the war, but when they’d moved on to the second phase of planning and still no Skywalker, Rex had offered to go wake him up.

It was a good morning and he was in a good mood and just before he reached the door to Skywalker’s quarters, he thought to himself how pleasant the hallway smelled.

_ Wait. _

The hallways smelled of sweat when companies jogged along them during training runs, and of bitter chemicals when the cleaning droids went through, but “pleasant” had never been a word Rex would have chosen for any stretch of battleship corridor.

He paused and took another deep breath, focusing on the scent. It was delicate and complex, so much so he couldn’t place what it was, fascinating and completely out of place with the austere lines of the hallway around him.

Shaking his head, Rex tapped one of the buttons on the panel next to the door once and then again. He knew ringing the chime was useless when Skywalker was out like this, but he waited for a respectful minute before tapping in his override code on the door. 

It slid open and a whiff of the strange fragrance rolled out over Rex, killing the friendly greeting he was ready to give.

Skywalker was asleep bundled up on the floor in the far corner of the room, lost in a tangle of sheets and clothing pulled in a messy line from his closet. And in a halo of the fragile, enticing scent Rex now recognized.  _ Oh hell.  _

_ He’s finally presented. _

_ And he’s an Omega. _

Stunned, Rex stepped back out into the hall and let the door close on the bizarre scene. He stared at the simple white in front of him and closed his eyes, frantically trying to remember the protocol for this sort of situation.  _ Everyone assumed he’d end up an Alpha or a Beta at least, safe on his own when this happened. _

_ We have to move fast. _

_ Think, dammit.  _ Rex took a deep breath and opened his eyes as the regulation came to him a line at a time, one he’d learned along with countless others in his command class but never thought he would actually have to use. 

_ Protocol 187, Subsection A, Physiological Cycles. Behavior of Jedi officer while in the field. _

_ One - Unexpected appearance of physiologically-derived erratic behavior from an Alpha or Omega Jedi officer necessitates temporary removal from post. Command officers must personally oversee removal and containment of the officer until the behavior passes.  _

_ Two - A Jedi officer experiencing initial presentation must be fully removed from post, placed into protective containment, and returned immediately to the Coruscant Jedi Temple. In all cases, no Alpha or Omega suppressants may be used in any manner as per Protocol 187, Subsection D. _

And there it was. Rex gave a worried glance at the door as he crossed the hall to one of the general comm panels that lined the walls at regular intervals and muttered a personal comm number to it.

“Kix, you on your sleep cycle right now?”

“Just came on duty, sir. And the ship meds just changed shifts. You need one of us?” 

“Just you. Not a word of this to anyone else. I’m sending you where I’m at. Bring sedatives.” 

____________________________

 

Anakin Skywalker woke in the dark with a slow, lazy stretch, puzzled and then after a moment of thought surprised by how roomy his bed felt.  _ Am I back home?  _ he wondered before registering the vague outline of a bunk off to his side.  _ No, I’m on the Resolute, but everything looks weird. _

_ Am I on the floor? _ He looked down in a pleasant daze to find himself wrapped up in piles of fabric that sheltered him from the cold floor he was in fact lying on. Relaxed and half-propped up in the corner of the room, Anakin considered his situation with a hazy satisfaction.  _ This is nice. It’s warm and comfortable and I think I’ll stay here for awhile. _

There was a hint of something in the air too, something faint but soothing in the way the heavy piles of clothing and sheets were. Anakin took a deep breath and smiled as the door to the room opened and more of it drifted in with the bright light of the corridor.

“Sir?”

“Hello, Rex,” he said, pulling his makeshift blankets around himself to enjoy their warmth more. “You smell nice. I think. Maybe it’s you? I don’t know... ”

Rex frowned, puzzling Anakin. “Don’t worry about it, sir. We’re just here to help you.”

Anakin grinned even though he had no idea what Rex was talking about, and leaned his head back into the softness of more sheets crammed behind him as someone else walked into the room and the door shut behind them. “Hey, Kix. Rex thinks I got hurt or something.”

“No, sir,” Kix nodded, clicking on one of the room’s dimmer night cycle lights to reveal he seemed concerned too. With careful movements, he set down a small bag on the bunk and knelt down next to Anakin. “You’re ok, just let me check your arm, all right?”

“How come?” In the depths of Anakin’s blissful stupor, a stray, unsettling thought shot through him. _  He’s nervous. They’re both nervous.  _ “Why are you guys nervous?”

Kix shot a glance up to Rex, who came to kneel on Anakin’s other side.

“Yeah, you’re the one who smells nice,” Anakin decided, soothed by the hint of something dark and rich like incense wafting on the wind. As long as Rex was here, he’d be all right, and his worry fell away.

“Sir,” Rex began, “I am sorry, but I have to relieve you of command.”


	2. Truths

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the positive feedback! <3\. I'm continuing this and living my best fic life as much as I can. ;) Probably 4 or 5(?) chapters in all.

In the dim light of Anakin’s quarters, just over the hum of the climate control shifting temperatures, Rex’s words drifted over him, strange and ridiculous. “Relieve… me… of command?”

He laughed and then looked down at the soft touch of Kix’s hand closing around his arm. “Stop it,” he mumbled, pulling it free with an annoyed grunt, and tucked it back under his makeshift covers. Settling back in against the corner, he turned his attention back to Rex crouching next to him. That lovely, unknown scent was hanging between them, and Anakin sighed as he relaxed once again. _I just want to listen to Rex._ “Why relieve me? I’m not even hurt.”

“I know, sir,” he said with the same serious expression he had come in the room with.

Anakin didn’t like it: he didn’t know why, but for a moment that look made him feel a little nervous before it was forgotten, hint of anxiety drifting down and away into his pleasant fog. “I’m fine,” he murmured. “Completely… fine.”

“But you feel a little strange, right?” Rex continued.

“No.” Anakin shook his head and tried to concentrate enough to get out what he was thinking. “You do.” He reached up, fingers sliding free from the drape of sheets and robes, and ran them along Rex’s cheek. “Why do you smell so ni--”

Rex stood up, fast enough it would have startled Anakin any other time, but he could only grin as he turned his head to look at Kix. “Why did he do that?”

“You’ve presented, General.” Somehow Kix said this bit of nonsense with the same measured, cool tone Anakin had heard him use a hundred times out in the field. Anakin tried to parse the idea from his comfortable tangle of warmth and softness, but every thought slipped away when he tried to add it to another.

“I’ve got this, vod,” Kix added without looking up, his own impassive gaze steady on Anakin but without the odd, intimidating quality Rex’s had carried. Anakin studied him, puzzled, as he spoke again. “You don’t have to stay.”

From above them, Rex cleared his throat, relief obvious as he turned away. “Thank you. I’ll go tell Kenobi.”

The door opened and shut, the heady scent fading, and Anakin gave a lazy scowl as Kix tugged his arm out into the cool air with a much firmer grip than he had used the first time. “Why did you make him leave?”

Kix sighed with frustration, patting Anakin’s forearm as Anakin studied his face and tried to make sense of the frown there. “General Skywalker, as per Protocol 187, you are relieved of command and will be returned to the Temple.”

A tiny sting accompanied those words, and Anakin looked down in shock at the needle in his arm, unable to do or say anything as Kix and the room around him faded into luscious darkness.

 

* * *

 

In the war room, Obi-Wan stood alone at a massive table laced with glowing lines, his datapads left here and there across the top of it like islands on a glass sea. He was lost in concentration, hand over his mouth as he studied the holo ghosts of the planet’s moons floating in front of him. _No, perhaps a base on each moon instead of keeping one planetside. More mobility and earlier defense lines._

At some point Cody had drifted away from the projected maps to lean out the door, and Obi-Wan gradually realized he was in a whispered conversation with someone outside. It wasn’t unusual for Cody to not let messengers in, allowing Obi-Wan to remain undisturbed while deep in thought, but this time Obi-Wan heard hints of concern both in their voices and in the Force.

He allowed his attention to drift from the spheres rotating in silence over the table to the conversation, puzzled. Cody’s back was to him, the line of his shoulders rigid under his grey jacket, and Obi-Wan let the Force brush past him into the hallway to sense who might be there. _Rex, it feels like. But no Anakin._

“Cody?” he asked. “It’s all right if Rex comes in. What’s going on?”

Cody moved aside with obvious reluctance. There was something about his expression, and the way that Rex stood awkward and uneasy in the hall, that left Obi-Wan cold where he stood.

“What is it?” He crossed the room, already sending to Anakin through their bond but only receiving the wordless lull of deep sleep in return. That normally would have reassured him, but the unhappy faces of his two most trusted men dimmed the warmth he felt coming from Anakin. “Is something wrong?”

Rex stepped inside and didn’t speak until the door closed behind him, and Obi-Wan was unable to tell if this was for privacy or to give him more time to think. “Well, sir… General Skywalker has presented.”

“Ah.” This should have been good news after all of the years waiting for it to finally happen, but all Obi-Wan could manage was confusion at why Rex looked so uncomfortable and his hands curled tight at his sides. Confusion and an inexplicable tension that had no apparent source. “Did he try to fight you? Apparently I got into a fistfight the day I first presented.”

“No,” Cody said, squeezing Obi-Wan’s shoulder in a way Obi-Wan knew was meant to comfort him but only worried him more. “Sir, there’s no gentle way to put this. Somehow, Skywalker is an omega.”

“What?” Disbelief strangled any further words: he could only stare at the two of them. The plans, the war room, all of it vanished as he desperately tried to imagine what else Cody could have said.

Rex scrubbed a hand through the stubble of his hair as he looked away and searched for the right words. “It’s true, sir. I went to wake him up and it was, uh, obvious what had happened.”

“It was?” Obi-Wan knew now what had put him on edge. The ghost of a scent drifting from Rex, one almost impossible to describe, caught halfway between the sun falling through leaves and heat rising from a desert at twilight.

_Anakin. That is my Anakin._

Bewilderment disappeared into primal fear. “I have to see him. I have to see him now.”

“No, sir, you can’t.” Cody said, hand tightening on Obi-Wan’s shoulder as Rex shifted to block the door in a swift, wordless agreement between the two. They watched him with the caution of guards rather than the soldiers and friends he fought and risked his life with more times than he could count.

“The hell I can’t.” Anger flared through Obi-Wan, hot and bright and poisonous. In the new silence that dragged on between the three of them, it bled out into a halo of bitter scent that warned the clones to step aside far more than anything he could have said.

“Sir, I know he’s your bunkmate,” Rex offered, his eyes narrowing in concentration as he fought his own building, instinctive anger to keep his voice level and quiet. “But you can’t see him. You’re an Alpha. It’s dangerous for you to see him right now.”

“And it’s any less dangerous for you to see him? To be there with him? You’re an Alpha too. You both are,” Obi-Wan snapped, unable to focus on anything through waves of adrenaline and the need to see Anakin rushing through him.

_I have to see Anakin, I have to make sure he’s ok, I have to make sure no one hurt him._

Cody let go, stepping between him and Rex with his hands out in as conciliatory of a gesture as the tense lines of his body allowed. “Sir, you know all of the men are Betas and the only Alphas on any ship are the commanders. And all of us commanders have been suppressed since before we left Kamino.”

“How do I know that?” Obi-Wan growled, chin lifting and all eloquence lost as he considered the two of them with new, delirious suspicion.

 _I can’t trust them with Anakin. They might try to claim him and they can’t because he’s mine. Mine!_ “How do I know you’re still taking suppressants?”

“It’s in all the commander rations. And we have an implant that releases it into our blood if the levels get too low.” Cody clenched his teeth, taking another long breath as anger swirled palpable in the air around the three of them, Obi-Wan’s scent laced with the fainter but no less dangerous hints of his and Rex’s.

“And if you listen to my voice, sir, you can see I am remaining calm. It’s not karking easy, but I am remaining calm.”

“Out of my way.” _Out of my way or I will_ hurt _both of you._

Obi-Wan blinked at the sudden fury of his thoughts, taking a step back in horror at his own rage.

 _No, no! What am I doing?_ He stumbled away to sink against the closest wall, fighting the surge of bloodlust that rolled through him and waving away Cody and Rex when they immediately reached to help him.

 _Force, no, please no._ It had been years since the violence of Obi-Wan’s Alpha nature had shown itself and panic shot through at the idea it still lurked within him, monstrous and brutal as it had ever been. Agonized seconds stretched into minutes as he scrambled to force down the violence with countless and guilty repetitions of the Jedi Code, Cody and Rex silently remaining where they stood with nothing more than concern for him in their auras in the Force.

 _They only want to help. How could I have misunderstood that?_ Obi-Wan finally realized. His shame sharpened into a hollow, unbearable ache, the only emotion stronger than it one of loathing for the Alpha need that still taunted him somewhere beneath his racing heart.

He had lost control. He had threatened Cody and Rex. He had almost risked Anakin’s life in his failure to control himself. Obi-Wan tilted his head back against the wall in weary defeat, resisting the urge to bang it against the smooth metal until every last remnant of those awful urges were lost in pain. “I, please… Is he safe?”

“Kix is with him in his room, and neither of us will go back to see him either. He’ll remain there and sedated all the way back to the Temple, “ Rex offered with as much kindness as the situation and his own adrenaline allowed. “He’s safe. I promise.”

Obi-Wan stared ahead as he pressed his hands to his face and slid them up to catch in his hair. His fingers tightened until it hurt, and the pain brought his thoughts back into focus just enough to let him understand the worst truth of all. “They’ll take him to the Garden.”

“Sir?” Cody knelt down next to him, he and Rex exchanging worried looks. “What does that mean?”

Obi-Wan forced the words out, each one breaking him apart until there were only shards left. “I may never see him again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> So yeah, we narrowly avoided a brawl between Panicked!Obi-Wan and his suppressed-but-still-Alpha clones. What do you think so far?


	3. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo hoo! I'm finally back with a new chapter. Hope you like it!

“Good morning, Knight Skywalker.”

 _Huh?_ The voice nudging Anakin from sleep was reassuringly clear after the last few days he had spent lost in a dream-like haze. _Where am I?_

What felt like forever ago, Kix had told him the ridiculous idea that he had presented, apparently as an Omega, and then there had been nothing but strange rises and falls from consciousness to dark and back again, the only constant Kix’s impassive face and the worry the Force told Anakin lay behind that expression. Food and sleep and showers came and went in dull sensations: in comparison, the room he found himself in now almost hurt with its brightness and clarity.

Anakin sat up slowly, tired and weak, relieved to see he was in quarters not unlike his own at the Temple. Plain walls rose around him, colored by light filtering in from slats running across windows on the far side of the room, and he lay in the firm comfort of a narrow bed. A table and chair sat across the room, almost exactly like the one in Anakin’s save the lack of droid parts and kits. 

And the stranger standing next to it.

Anakin sat up, startled, and in return the man, a human in typical Jedi clothing, gave a bow. “Apologies if I surprised you. Welcome home. You’ve returned to the Temple.”

Despite his puzzlement, Anakin knew that much at least to be true. The peace of those who lived in the Temple complex and the solemn, calm atmosphere left by those who had gone before were all around him, soothing in a way a Jedi could never really explain to one who was not sensitive in the Force.

“Wait…” Anakin looked past him through the window slats. Hints of color lay on the other side, bright and vibrant and almost alien considering the barren wall that Anakin’s room looked out onto. “What is that?”

The man smiled. “Why don’t you come see?” He stood and walked over, holding a hand out. “I’ll help you. You’re going to be somewhat weak for awhile.”

Anakin took it and let the man help him up, confusion deepening. “I thought Healers wore white?” He looked down at his own clothing to find he was in one of his usual tunics and set of pants rather than the plain cottons patients wore in the Halls of Healing. “Where am I? I mean, I know this is the Temple, but I don’t understand why I’m not in my own room.”

“You are where you will be safe,” the man answered, guiding Anakin out the door and into a small hallway with other doors and a bright pool of daylight falling from an arch off to the side. 

Focused on staying upright and mind not much better off than his body, Anakin took one small step after another and let the man’s odd sentence fade to the back of his mind for the moment. Lovely scents drifted through the arch, and as they reached it and turned to go outside he understood what they were.

Flowers drifted in lush clouds across a courtyard garden long enough another ten sets of windows sat off on either side before the green and stones of the wandering path disappeared into another arch down the way, and he caught a glimpse of the greenery continuing into another courtyard beyond that. The sound of water splashing onto rocks came from somewhere nearby as well, but all he could feel was horror at the beauty before him.

“I’m in the Garden.”

“Yes. Welcome, Knight Skywalker.” 

The man caught Anakin as he stumbled back, and guided him with gentle hands to a bench artfully placed next to a fountain and a spray of red blossoms. “It’s all right. You’re safe here.”

“I can’t be here.”

“You have been honored by the Force, Knight Skywalker. This is a blessing of the highest kind.” The man moved to stand back a respectful distance as Anakin slumped back against the bench. “It’s sometimes a shock, I know. For a few, it can take some time to get used to.”

“Am I really an Omega?”

“Yes.”

Anakin glared out at the pleasant scene, rattled and furious at the man’s confirmation of what he was. “I want out of here.”

“I am sorry, but you know that isn’t possible.”

He pushed on the arm of the bench, unsteady as he rose and heart tight in his chest. “I’m not staying here. I need to get back to my men. To the war.” _To Obi-Wan._

“There is no longer a war for you.” The guide gave another bow and a hopeful smile despite the scowl Anakin responded with. “As it has been known since the oldest times, Omegas are the most precious of the Order, the purest embodiments of the Light. When the Force revealed that part of your nature, all other bonds and duties were destroyed, as the scrolls say, ‘like mist by the rising sun’.”

“I’m leaving. How do I get back to the rest of the Temple?” Anakin sat back down with a grunt, frustrated at the weak tremble of his legs. “You’re a Priest of the Garden, aren’t you? Order some guards to take me back.”

“Yes, I am a Priest, and I can never do that, Knight Skywalker. You know that to leave this place, to leave the Temple, would doom you. There is only one way you may safely return to the world outside, and very few ever do. Or want to.”

The man gestured out across the lovely view, patience and serenity in his voice. “This is a sacred place, where you can embrace the blessed side of yourself without fear. Meditation, the arts, literature, even new forms of saber techniques or styles, whatever you desire to do. Some of the Order’s most beautiful and lasting things have come from those who live in the Garden.”

Anakin bit back a curse and lifted his chin, heart starting to pound with anxiety alongside his anger. “I do the Order a lot more good out on the front lines than I will here. There has to be some kind of suppressant I can take.”

“You know that there is none, and that all suppressants are toxic to Force-sensitives. Your biology classes taught only the truth in this matter. The stronger one is in the Force, the deadlier the reaction.” The man shook his head, puzzled at Anakin’s stubbornness. “The will of the Force, Knight Skywalker, has been shown. It is for you to stay here where you are safe from danger, from Alphas who would quickly claim you.”

Silence fell between them, the Priest too gentle to say aloud what his words had made Anakin remember. There were whispered tales the older Padawans told each other about one of their own lost almost a dozen years ago, a promising Padawan who presented as an Omega and then fled the Temple in the middle of the night. What exactly happened varied from telling to telling, but the ending was the same as the tabloid holos blared alongside their usual lies a few weeks later. 

Only the Jedi knew the truth of the lurid headlines. 

Somehow one of the protected Jedi Omega had been found outside of the Temple, kidnapped, and taken off-world by those who knew what he would be worth. The story the tabloids told was frightening and rang true of what had happened in older, more chaotic times: the Padawan had been auctioned off to a mystery Alpha as a novelty, the young man unwilling yet unable to resist his new master’s commands. 

The Order had searched for the lost Padawan for years but had never found him, and under the thrall of his master, everyone knew the Omega would never be able to force himself to escape. He was gone forever, the Padawan telling the story would whisper, leaving all of them somber and quiet as they pondered his fate.

 _He became a slave_ , Anakin had thought with disgust when he first heard it. _And he couldn’t even set himself free if he wanted to._ The idea had horrified Anakin then, and horrified him even more now as he took in the bleak truth of what it meant for him.

_If I leave, the same thing will happen to me._

“Wait.” He looked up, desperate, his hands curled into fists in his lap. “You said a minute ago that there was a way I could leave. Isn’t it some kind of ceremony? Or challenge or something?”

“Yes, if you choose an Alpha Jedi and he proved worthy of you. The bond between you would be powerful, especially with your unique strength in the Force, and keep all others away for good. 

“But,” the Priest tilted his head, voice quiet and cautious at the hope that sprung to life in Anakin’s eyes, “it happens very rarely. It would be impossible for you to meet an Alpha here. All Priests are Betas, and no Alphas are allowed in the Garden no matter the reason.” 

At Anakin’s gaze growing more distant with thought as he considered something, the Priest continued with a soft reminder. “And outside of the Garden, few Alphas in the Order are strong enough to pass the Trial. Even fewer are willing to accept an Omega’s request and risk their own banishment from the Temple if they fail at--”

“There’s something I have to say to start it,” Anakin interrupted, staring out across the garden without seeing it as he concentrated. This was another story the Padawans told each other, almost a fairy tale for how long ago the last one had happened. The words came to him in a rush, and he barely remembered to say the Alpha’s name first. “Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

“What? He is--”

“I call for my mate.”

The Priest held out his hands in surprise, shocked. “Knight Skywalker, the Trial of the Blood is not to be undertaken lightly! Please think about--”

“I’m one of the blessed of the Light, aren’t I? My will is not to be questioned, right?” Anakin stood again, forcing himself to remain steady as he growled each word through his weariness and anger. “I call for my mate.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what do you think? Anakin's not very good at thoughtful consideration, I think we can all agree...


	4. Strength

Obi-Wan stood before the ring of the Council as he had countless times before, the permanent blue of Coruscant’s skies like haloes behind them, but this time with his hands clasped behind him so tightly it almost hurt. His anxiety lay hidden by the pile of his robe’s sleeves down his wrists just as his confusion was hidden by his usual impassive expression. 

None of his fellow Alphas, as tradition required all Council members to be, brought any attention to his unease. He was sure they had scented it and chosen to remain quiet, and was grateful beyond words for their understanding.

 _I must not appear weak. Not in front of this man_ , he told himself, glancing over at the Head Priest standing next to him before returning his attention to the ring of Masters before them.

When the Council had recalled Obi-Wan from the front within a week after Anakin had been returned, they had told him with somber expressions made blue by the holo that it was for the ceremony allowed for Omegas who wished to find an Alpha mate. Obi-Wan would be given a formal opportunity to accept or reject Anakin’s call before members of the Council and the Garden.

No one said the obvious and no one needed to: it was his and Anakin’s chance, their only chance, to be together again. 

In the short, tense hours since Obi-Wan had come back home he had been rushed through an explanation of the Trial of the Blood by a priest who warned him after almost every sentence about its difficulty and risk of failure. He had listened and nodded with as much politeness as his anxiety allowed, already knowing what he would say when the time came. _I will do anything to have him back. Anything._  

At the appointed time, he had bathed and dressed in his formal garments and robe, subtly different from his usual ones in their finer weaves of linen and wool. They felt strange after so long between occasions that warranted them, and that sense of unreality followed him as he left his room and made his way along the familiar halls of the Temple to meet the Council. 

When he arrived in the Council room and came to stand next to the Head Priest of the Garden, the man distinctive in the white robe of his calling, he hadn’t known what to expect. But it wasn’t this. 

Ten minutes in, the Priest stood unruffled under the tense stares of the Council around him, as if he were a saber master training younglings rather than sharing a room with some of the brightest and best Jedi in the Order.

“This is unwise, Brother Renn,” Master Windu repeated, shaking his head. “We’ve already lost an excellent Jedi and General, and now you are here to demand we lose another one.”

“You have not lost Knight Skywalker,” Renn replied with a serene confidence. “He has been found by the Force. And I demand nothing, Brother in the Light. I only offer that which the Omega has asked for. It is not my responsibility if the Alpha accepts and fails.”

“Kenobi is the best tactician we have, Brother, and the bond between him and Skywalker runs deep,” Master Plo Koon tried with a respectful bow of his head. “Is there no other way Skywalker can rejoin him at his side? For the sake of each other, and of those fighting to end this war?”

“Alphas,” Renn sniffed, casting a dismissive glance around the room. “Always so quick to think of violence.”

Obi-Wan blinked in disbelief at the silence that followed from not only Master Plo Koon but the other Masters seated around the room. No reproach, no visible anger, but their seething frustration was undeniable. Even Master Yoda allowed himself only a faint frown rather than one of his famed retorts. _They can’t help me. They can’t change this. Things must be done the way of the Garden or not at all._

“As I began, Skywalker has called for his mate, Brothers, and the call must be denied or answered.” Renn turned to Obi-Wan. “Which choice will you make?”

Obi-Wan gave a bow, the simple gesture heavy in his stomach at the chance he was about to take. “To answer. I accept the Trial of the Blood.” 

Master Yoda cleared his throat. “Sure about this, are you, Obi-Wan? Banished from the Order you will be, if either half of the Trial you fail.”

“Yes. Forgive me, Masters, but…” Obi-Wan paused, looking around the room as he searched for what to say. _If this is to be my last time in this room, I cannot stand before my friends and mentors and say anything less than the truth._ “I do not do this to free a general.”

He swallowed, unable to believe he was finally saying it aloud. “… I do this to free my lover.”

A few of the Masters exchanged glances, Renn said nothing, and Master Windu gave a long sigh that suggested more exasperation than any real surprise. “While your honesty is appreciated, you are not the first two Jedi to see the Light in each other, Kenobi. Nor will you be the last.”

It was Obi-Wan’s turn to fall silent, stunned. 

“In your case, whether your shared emotions are the curse of attachment or the blessing of the Light is for none here to say, though some of us may like to,” Master Windu continued in his usual impassive, unreadable tone as Master Yoda nodded. “The Trial will reveal which it is, and if the Force wills your victory, then all will accept it.”

“May the Force be with you,” Master Plo Koon offered, not without kindness and to quiet nods of agreement from around the room.

He bowed from his chair, the other Masters doing the same in rustles of linen as Obi-Wan returned the bow with a surprised one of his own.

Renn looked over them all in silence, a ghost in white.

 

* * *

 

 

“Do I have to do all this?” Anakin grumbled two days later. He was sitting on a large rock in one of the courtyards dotted along the river of flowers swirling through what he refused to think of as his new home. Two Padawans circled him with bowls and soft brushes, carefully dusting faint hints of gold along his bare chest and back.

“You called for your mate,” the Head Priest answered from where he stood across the way. _Renn, I think is his name._ “The rituals must be followed in all ways to maintain the presence of the Light among us. We are one with the Force.”

“And the Force is with us,” the two Padawans replied as they worked, leaving the faintest shimmer along Anakin’s shoulders and in his hair.

“It’s embarrassing,” Anakin muttered to the ground, relieved they were at least leaving his face alone. “Do I get a shirt at some point in all this?”

“Why do you think you would not?”

“Because this is really starting to feel like a slave auction, that’s why.”

Renn pursed his lips, for all of his calm words not as patient as Tavensa, the first priest Anakin had met. “You have come from a brutish world, Knight Skywalker. Alphas define their existence in being victors or the defeated. Everything is conflict, everything is strife. That is not the way of the Force. It never has been and it never will be. Do you consider your potential mate a slave owner?”

“Obi-Wan? Never!”

“Then you are not a slave. It is simple, is it not? Peace and acceptance come from awareness of the duality of the Force.”

Anakin flexed his hand half-way into a particularly rude gesture as it hung in his lap, and he imagined shoving them all out of the way and escorting himself to whatever place the Trial was going to begin, but he took a deep breath and forced himself to let go of the idea. The Padawan returning to the Priest’s side and the other, dotting the last of the gold along his collarbones in gentle sweeps, did not deserve his anger.

“I want a shirt.”

“Little Brother?” Renn gestured, and the first Padawan hurried back into the cool shade of the hall behind them. 

“I want a normal shirt. Nothing weird.”

The Priest gave the slightest of sighs as the young Padawan trotted back out with Anakin’s tunic and tabards. He waited until Anakin tied them on with rough, impatient yanks and tugs before producing a folded slip of something from his collars. “You have so little trust in those who only wish to protect you.” 

Anakin’s anger faded into puzzlement as the man held the item out to him with both hands. The rectangle, folded with neat creases and tied with a white cord, looked rougher than flimsiplast. Anakin took it, fascinated by its coarse surface. “Is this actual paper?”

“Yes, the single letter allowed from the Alpha to the Blessed One that has called him. When you have read it, we shall go to the Trial.”

On Coruscant, like most other Core Worlds, writing by hand was considered more of an art to pursue than a basic skill necessary to master. Anakin could write legibly when required out in less technologically advanced systems, but he had always been fascinated by the elegant, careful lines of Obi-Wan’s handwriting as Obi-Wan worked across a page in his journal or in formal greetings to diplomats and rulers that still followed old ways.

That spare dance of characters flowed across the outside of the letter now, Anakin’s name written in a perfectly balanced line. He untied the cord and unfolded the paper, anxiety making its lightness in his hands heavier than stone across his heart.

_Anakin, my dear one,_

_I am told it will be the day of the Trial when you receive this letter. By the ancient rites, I will soon have a chance to prove that I deserve you by my side and can protect you from both others and myself. I hope that I do, more than I have ever hoped for anything in my life._

_But I fear that I may not. I fear that if I do not fall to others today that I will fall to my own Alpha nature tonight._

_When you see this vicious thing that lives within me, you may not wish to be with me any longer. And I will not blame you. If I lose now or succeed but bring you the slightest harm this evening, I will happily be banished from this place and leave my robes and saber in penance, and it will still not be enough to atone. The thought of hurting you terrifies me._

_There is one more thing I must tell you that I never have before. It was always too frightening to say, but now I realize it is more frightening that I may have to leave without you knowing how I feel._

_I love you._

_I love you and I will fight for you. May the Force give me the strength to show that my love is more powerful than the pull of my awful nature._

_Yours in heart, as long as I breathe,_

_Obi-Wan_

 

Anakin read the letter again, throat tight and gaze coming to rest on the simple words he had longed to hear Obi-Wan say since they had found their way to each other months ago.

A ghost of a scent lingered on the paper, one that soothed him like a sudden rain on a hot afternoon as he took one deep breath and then another to calm himself. 

 _Obi-Wan_. 

Anakin closed his eyes with the fragile beginnings of a smile. He had assumed after his half-remembered and only encounter with an Alpha, when Rex had discovered him, that all Alphas would smell the same as Rex did: rich, heady incense impossible to ignore.

 _But they don’t. Obi-Wan’s scent_ _is like…_ Anakin’s smile grew fond as images came to him, flashes tied up in the crisp, cool fragrance drifting up from the letter. Dangerous storms rolling through fields, sunlight strong enough to blind. A mountain range vast and impassable. Power. Strength. 

All of that lethal energy protecting him. All of it keeping him safe.

Anakin opened his eyes, so entranced by the promise of Obi-Wan’s scent that it took effort to focus once again on Renn and the frown he wore. 

“It’s time to go to the dueling ground, Knight Skywalker.” 

“Obi-Wan’s going to beat you,” Anakin told him with a dazed grin. “You’ll see.”

 

* * *

 

 

The training fields of the Garden lay open to the sky in wide, sunken pits ringed at the top with elaborately carved balconies for instructors and observers. For one like the young Priest Esaif, brought to the Garden ten years past now, the barren walls and dusty ground made him uneasy. The training pits were the only places in the Gardens left empty and devoid of life, and while all of the Blessed and Priests sparred and practiced there he had never been able to shake his discomfort with the lifeless stone walls.

He stood in a tunnel that led out onto the largest field, where the upper walls were marked for today with trailing banners of white winding lazily through the sky with each breeze that passed. No one shouted or sparred in the neighboring fields, the only sound Head Priest Renn’s whispering to him and brother Priest Faedin.

“We have been given a gift of the highest from the Light,” Renn nodded out toward the sunlight and the group ringed around the main balcony on the far end. “Knight Skywalker has struggled to accept the will of the Light that brought him here, but it is only because he thinks the savage life he has known is all there is, and that this Alpha will return him to it. But we know the truth and where he belongs. Once the Alpha is beaten and banished, Skywalker will understand where he is meant to be.”

“Brother, there are three of us,” Faedin whispered back, confused. “Even an Alpha can’t beat three men at once. How much of a threat can this one be?”

“A serious one if we are lazy. Or overconfident. May the Light be with us.”

“May the Light be with us,” Esai and Faedin murmured with bows of their heads.

Far above them on the balcony at the opposite end of the field, Anakin waited, arms crossed and a stony expression on his face. Cody stood at attention on a smaller balcony to his left, his presence explained to Anakin as a formal witness summoned in place of Obi-Wan’s late master to certify the duel was held objectively and fairly. 

He and Cody had happened to look toward each other when Anakin was first brought out, exchanging grim nods before Cody traced his finger across his own cheek in a quick pair of lines. It was a battle signal that had evolved into one also used for luck among Anakin and Obi-Wan’s men-- “ _path clear”--_ and Anakin accepted it with a nervous smile. When they both turned back out to face the field, he felt a little less alone as he studied the bare dirt stretching out all around them. 

To Anakin’s right was the first Priest Anakin had met, Tavensa. Tavensa was serving in place of Head Priest Renn, who tradition dictated participated in the first half of the Trial, and he seemed almost as nervous as Anakin, absentmindedly smoothing the layered collars and tabards of his temporary new station.

A dozen Priests stood ringed around the other balconies looking out on the fields, hooded and faceless, and at the call of one of them Anakin and Tavensa moved immediately to the railing. “Let the three enter!”

Three men made their way to the middle of the field, bowing first in the direction of Cody’s balcony and then Anakin and Tavensa’s. Handing off their robes to three Padawans that trailed them, they began removing their tunics in slow, somber movements.

The priest that had spoken continued, low voice a rumble across the massive pit. “For the duel of strength, as per the old ways the loss of life is not allowed, that of either protector or challenger. Lightsabers have been adjusted to leave only weak burns. Should combatants engage in physical combat itself, they must refrain from causing lethal injuries.”

Anakin knew the rules from what Tavensa had told him earlier, but the charged silence of the field as all listened to the priest’s declaration made the words far more discomforting than they had been in Anakin’s pleasant quarters.

“A lightsaber strike across the chest, back, or throat will be seen as a kill. In physical combat, if a man falls unconscious during the fight or cannot stand on his own due to his injuries, he will be counted as killed.”

 _Obi-Wan can do this_ , Anakin repeated to himself as the priest finished with one more loud cry. “Let the challenger enter!”

Obi-Wan entered from a tunnel somewhere beneath the main balcony and walked to the middle of the pit before he turned to give low bows the same as the first three, the distance not enough to hide the cool expression he wore and the desperate eyes that betrayed it. He stood and turned back to the priests across from him, stripping his tabards and tunic off as well and giving them to a Padawan who hurried away with them.

Anakin’s heart ached at the proud, familiar line of Obi-Wan’s shoulders and the scattering of marks across his back, old scars crossed by newer ones from the war. He didn’t dare reach out through their bond and distract Obi-Wan, as much as it hurt to resist: Obi-Wan’s side of the gold thread that held them together lay frozen over by icy determination. Anger glinted there too, bright for the men across from him and laced with shame for himself.

There was no room for thoughts of Anakin that might make him slow or uncertain, and as much as Anakin wished for Obi-Wan to look back over his shoulder at him he knew it was for the best that he didn’t. The frontlines had stripped away naive ideas of what mattered and what didn’t between lovers, and Anakin only gave a silent prayer from his childhood as the auburn tilt of Obi-Wan’s head suggested he was studying the three men spreading out across their side of the field.

_Guide him and grant him your blessings, Father of the Dunes. Please._

Below them, the sun warm on his pale shoulders, Obi-Wan regarded his three opponents with an unreadable expression and the slightest shift of his feet. _The Head Priest, Renn, in the middle and the two younger on either side of him. They’re about far enough apart now, I think._

_Please let this idea work._

“As it was written in ancient times, once the Alpha lights his blade, the protectors will as well, and the duel will begin!” the priest called, clapping his hands.

Obi-Wan lifted his chin but otherwise remained still, saber hanging unlit at his side as he studied the three with apparent, careful consideration of who he might attack first even though he had already chosen as soon as he had seen them walk onto the field.

_Nervous one first._

He charged at the young man on the right. 

The priest stepped back as surprised gasps echoed from above, slapping his hand down over his saber on his belt before he froze with a stunned expression. He had realized what Obi-Wan was counting on: the rules said he couldn’t draw until Obi-Wan did. 

Obi-Wan shot across the dusty ground toward him, the others too late to help by the time they recovered from their own shock and ran toward him.

The priest fumbled to get his saber off his belt at least, fighting the urge to light it as Obi-Wan rushed toward him. All of the young man’s imaginings of a classic and gentlemanly duel had soured into a blind panic that left him dancing in place and unable to even choose a proper stance to settle into, Obi-Wan noted with cold satisfaction as he bore down on him.

With a leap and spin through the air, Obi-Wan snapped his saber to life in a bright whirl of blue at the last second and slashed at the priest’s arm before he could draw. His opponent jerked back with a cry and dropped his saber, but Obi-Wan, rolling and skidding to his feet, didn’t hesitate to lash his blade out hard across the priest’s chest.

The young man stumbled back with another cry and a fresh red welt seething across his skin as a Padawan rushed out to help him off the field.

The gasps from the audience gave way to shocked silence as Obi-Wan pivoted and snapped his blade up to point at the other two in a Soresu hiss of blue: the Alpha had brought three down to two in less than a minute.

It had been a gamble, and it had worked, but there was no time for relief. Obi-Wan darted his gaze back and forth between the two men pounding toward him with their own sabers dangerous lines of color. The element of surprise was gone, and he awaited them with a slide of his boot out into the dirt.

 _Renn, green saber. Other priest, blue._ His mind raced at the swirl of opening swings the two fell into as they drew closer, a hint at the styles they favored.

_Green one of the classic defensive styles, well-practiced. Blue same but too young to be precise._

_Blue first._  

He whipped his hand out and the first priest’s saber shot to it, a solid impact of metal against his palm, and found a small grin on his face. There would be time later for guilt at his pleasure at the new shock on the men’s faces, but for the moment there was only the satisfying leap of another blue blade into life at his side as he brought both to cross across his chest.

The younger priest pounded toward him and leapt into the air with a slash of light aimed at his head. Obi-Wan danced back, shoving the obvious distraction aside with one blade as he deflected the head priest’s charge at his legs with the other. Obi-Wan found little about the war to like, but here every awful battle he’d fought in returned to help him as they slashed and parried across the field.

Here those battles were his savior. His two opponents had only ever known Temple training and Temple sparring, and Obi-Wan ducked and spun in instinctive moves that met the pretty flourishes of their sabers in sizzling clashes every time.

For the priests, for everyone that had not seen Obi-Wan in battle, his skill in not only holding off two but matching their attacks with his own brought stares of disbelief and a new tension to the air that lay heavy and out of place with the clear skies above them all. Even Anakin didn’t call to him, only his frantic hope and fear seething in the Force like a sun rising behind Obi-Wan and his opponents.

For a long set of minutes, the pair attacked Obi-Wan in a flurry of strikes, punches, and kicks, at the same time as much as the space their sabers needed allowed, harsh flashes of green and blue scraping the dirt black and sky white before they retreated far out of reach. They were talking to each other in the Force and likely reevaluating their strategy where he couldn’t hear it, Obi-Wan realized with a cold glare as he wiped at the blood under his nose and took advantage of the pause to catch his breath. _I see they’re also taking advantage of what the rules didn’t specify_.

He sprinted forward in a test of the younger priest’s distraction, scoring a near hit across his chest before Renn slid in to deflect his attack.

The fight whirled on once again, the world nothing but sweat and concentration and blinding crackles of saber strikes, before Obi-Wan understood what the two had decided to do during their silent conversation. They weren’t holding back: it was clear they were fighting to the best of their ability. But it didn’t matter that their skill with a blade was less refined by experience than Obi-Wan’s or that their physical attacks landed with less accuracy than his.

Now they were purposefully avoiding any risky attacks, anything that might leave them open in the slightest to Obi-Wan’s twin sabers, their teamwork allowing them that luxury as they circled him.

 _They don’t have to be better than me if they’re going to grind me down like this,_ he told himself with a growl as he tossed aside another solid rattle of Renn’s blade against one of his and ducked another blow from the other priest. 

_They just have to outlast me._

Anger swelled hot and bitter in his chest, and he gave Renn a kick that landed with a satisfying thud before he rolled back to avoid the other’s stab where his stomach would have been. _No! I will not lose Anakin to them!_

_He is mine!_

Instinct howled through him and he slammed his way through their attacks and leapt away, landing with a spin to face them. He flung the second saber aside to more shocked murmurs from the crowd above, pointing his own at the younger priest in an unspoken challenge before he lowered it to his side.

The priest charged him without thinking, amazed that he would get to be the one to bring the Alpha down and deaf to the head priest’s cry of warning behind him.

Obi-Wan waited, panting, beyond fear and remorse as he watched the priest whip his blue blade up and down toward him in a vicious overhead strike.

He turned aside just as the blade fell slicing past him in a hot shudder of air. As the man’s inertia carried him past, Obi-Wan stepped back into place and spun his saber into a reverse grip. The momentum carried it neatly behind him and from the shudder he felt along the hilt it had jammed as hard against his opponent’s back as much as the weakened power of the saber would allow. He never looked away from Renn pounding toward him and whipped his saber back to lie in a defensive line over his chest.

Far away in some place that was not the howling winter wind of his mind, Obi-Wan heard an ugly thump and wails of pain behind him. It was possible, he observed, that he had knocked the priest down harder than he had intended. He didn’t care.

He welcomed Renn’s furious slashes with a snarl. _Anakin is MINE!_

A quick arc of lightning danced across the field as they met and parted in a chain of furious strikes, Obi-Wan’s winding lines of violent precision and the priest’s growing wild and desperate as he tried to hold him off.

“He must stay with us!” the head priest hissed as they shoved against each other, blade to blade and hints of green and blue sparking in their sweat-damp hair. “He is blessed in the Light! You are tainted! A monster!”

Obi-Wan gave him a hollow grin, drunk with adrenaline and power and guilt. “I know.”

Anakin, like the others around him far above the duel, had no idea what the two in the middle of the field were saying, but he didn’t need to. Obi-Wan drove the priest down to the ground in another beautifully vicious set of hits, and kept him there with a solid kick to the head when the man tried to stand.

The priest sprawled with a boneless slump into the dirt. Obi-Wan watched him, chin lifted, and muttered something before he turned toward the balcony Anakin stood on.

Panting, face bloody, sweat streaking through the dust on his chest and arms, Obi-Wan snapped his saber off and hooked it back onto his belt. Drawing one long breath and then another, he gave a long, silent bow that was both respectful of the ceremony and defiant all at once.

“I have shown that my blood is strong!” Obi-Wan shouted up toward the main balcony. “Let me show that it is pure!”

“Well, at least he knows the phrases,” Tavensa sighed to himself, and Anakin had the distinct impression it was not because of disappointment that Obi-Wan had won but resignation at the fact he would have to stand in as Head Priest for a while longer.

Tavensa stepped forward and called out loudly enough for those around the field to hear. “As the day has shown strength, the night will show purity. Let all return to rest and prepare until sunset.”

Anakin grinned down at Obi-Wan, risking a flicker of pride and love across their bond before any others could sense it. _You did it! You won!_

Adrenaline and shame made the answer hesitant, Obi-Wan looking down as he combed a hand through his disheveled hair and tried to find his way back to enough calm to allow speech. _Do you… still want me after seeing that?_

Anakin frowned. The fight had been a love letter written in violence, and that was all he needed. That Obi-Wan had done it for him. _Yes. Of course I do!_

Obi-Wan gave a faint, unsure smile up to him before a Padawan led him back into the tunnels.

“This part tonight will be easy for Obi-Wan,” Anakin smiled over at Tavensa, relief bright and almost intoxicating, before he turned in Cody’s direction and lifted his hand in a wave and flash of a victory signal. Cody returned both with his own relief clear despite the distance. “Obi-Wan and me just sitting and looking at each other? I hope you haven’t gotten too used to me being here.”

Tavensa raised an eyebrow and studiously kept his voice from showing the concern on his face when Anakin turned back to him. “Believe it or not, I only wish what is best for you, Knight Skywalker.”

“Yeah, you’re tired of me.”

“Well,” Tavensa shrugged with what Anakin swore was a hint of fondness, “some of the most beautiful flowers grow best in the wild.”

“Yep.”

As they moved back into the painted halls, Tavensa gave him a curious look. “I must ask, why do you think tonight’s part of the Trial will be easy?”

Anakin shrugged. “He’s Obi-Wan. Self-control is easy for him. Especially with me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Remember, don't screw with Obi-Wan.
> 
> One more chapter to go! No promises on an update time since I'm rotating between this and two-long form fics, but I will finish it. It'll probably be another month or two before I get the last chapter up.


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